Tiras

A son of Japeth, supposed to have been the forefather of the ancient Thracians, Gen 10:2 .\par

Gen 10:2. Josephus (Ant. 1:6, section 1) identifies his descendants with the Thracians, including the Getae (from whence came the Goths) and Dacians. Tuch derives the Tyrsenians from Tiras. (See ROSH.) Thracian tribes occupied most of northern and central Asia Minor originally. The Bithynians were Thracians. So also the Mariandynians, Paphlagonians, Phrygians (another form of the Thracian Briges), and Mysians (answering to the Moesi). Tiras follows Meshech in the genealogy, just as the Thracian tribes of Asia Minor adjoined the Moschi toward the W. Thus Genesis 10 includes among Japhet’s descendants the vast nation of the Thracians, extending from the Halys in Asia Minor to the Drave and Save in Europe. Bria (perhaps "town"), in Mesembria, Selymbria, is a solitary relic of the Thracian tongue. The name has been identified as appearing in Aga-thyrsi. Taur-us, and Tyras (the river Dniester).

[Ti’ras]

Son of Japheth: his descendants have not been traced, but are supposed to correspond with the Thracians. Gen 10:2; 1Ch 1:5.

TIRAS.—A son of Japheth (Gen 10:2), formerly identified with Thrace, but of late much more plausibly with the Turusha, a piratical people who invaded Syria and Egypt in the 13th cent. b.c. But Tiras has also been identified with Tarsus (= E. Cilicia) and even Tarshish (wh. see).

J. F. McCurdy.

tı̄´ras (תּירס, tı̄raṣ; Θειράς, Theirás, Lucian Θιράς, Thirás): A son of Japheth (Gen 10:2 (P); 1Ch 1:5). Not mentioned elsewhere; this name was almost unanimously taken by the ancient commentators (so Josephus, Ant., I, vi, 1) to be the same as that of the Thracians (Θρᾶκες, Thrákes); but the removal of the nominative ending ς does away with this surface resemblance. Tuch was the first to suggest the Τυρσηνιοί, Tursēnioi, a race of Pelasgian pirates, who left many traces of their ancient power in the islands and coasts of the Aegean, and who were doubtless identical with the Etruscans of Italy. This brilliant suggestion has since been confirmed by the discovery of the name Turusa among the seafaring peoples who invaded Egypt in the reign of Merenptah (W.M. Muller, AE, 356 ff). Tiras has also been regarded as the same as Tarshish.